6 7 8 9 10
good things
for SMEs
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ISO standards…
What ISO standards can do
for you
Are you a small to medium-sized enterprise
(SME) looking to expand your business?
Then this little brochure is for you. It will
show you how ISO International Standards
can enhance your business as they have
done for thousands of other small enterprises before you.
10 real benefits
We spoke to 10 SMEs about how they used
ISO standards to improve their businesses.
These small companies, employing
between 3 and 48 people, have found
that standards gave them the tools to
hone their products and services, open
up to new customers and markets, grow
their business faster, and increase profits.
The right standard
for the job p. 22
Get a head start p. 23
How we develop standards
to suit your business p. 24
What is ISO? p. 25
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help you improve the quality
of your goods and services pp. 2-3
help you drive growth,
cut costs and increase profits pp. 4-5
give your business a competitive
edge pp. 6-7
open up export markets for
your goods and services pp. 8-9
open doors to new customers and
strengthen your existing business pp. 10-11
help you compete with bigger
enterprises pp. 12-13
enhance your credibility and secure
customer confidence pp 14-15
sharpen your business processes
and increase efficiency pp. 16-17
strengthen
your marketing pitch pp. 18-19
help you comply
with regulations pp. 20-21
What SMEs are saying...
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dB - Laboratório de Engenharia
ISO standards help you
improve the quality
of your goods and services
“Running a business that provides
specialized services calls for rigorous
knowledge of technical standards such
as ISO/IEC 17025* and ISO 1996**, which
in turn helps improve the quality of our
products. Our commitment to the standardization process gives our company the
opportunity to contribute to the development of standards and reassures our
clients as to the quality of our services.”
Acústica has nine employees
and provides specialized
acoustics engineering services.
Krisdany Cavalcante
Technical Director of Engineering
dB - Laboratório de
Engenharia Acústica
Brazil
* ISO/IEC 17025 establishes general requirements for
the competence of testing and calibration laboratories.
** ISO 1996 is a series of acoustics standards covering
the description, measurement and assessment of
environmental noise.
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ISO standards help you
drive growth, cut costs
and increase profits
“ISO standards help us find new markets for our
products and make the production and handling
of nanomaterials more secure. Today’s new-found
safety in these areas has brought significant growth
to the market. Being one of the first companies to
adopt ISO’s nanomaterials and nanotechnologies
standards* – ISO/TS 12025, ISO/TR 13121 and
ISO/TR 13329 – has helped Avanzare secure a leadership position on the nanomaterials market. Naturally,
implementing a standard represents a cost for any
company, but these are quickly recouped by creating
new products and embedding new processes in line
with the standard’s guidance. Now is a time of strong
international growth, so taking part in both national
(AENOR) and ISO committees will mean we can adapt
our products to future international regulations.”
Avanzare employs
35 people and provides
nanomaterials and
nanotechnology-based
solutions.
* ISO has published over 40 standards and documents on
nanotechnology and nanomaterials.
Julio Gómez
CEO
Avanzare
Spain
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Mike Chilman
Managing Director
MC Fire Protection
United Kingdom
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ISO standards give your business
a competitive edge
“When the business started in 2000, it was clear to me, as
founder, that an accountable standard for our services and
products was essential. We had always worked to high standards and although we knew that, we wanted our clients to know
and understand it too. At the time, we were attempting to gain
– and work with – new larger clients, who were requesting
audited proof of our methods and standards of practice. That’s
when we became BS EN ISO 9001:2008 certified. This decision
keeps us at the cutting edge with regard to the quality of our
products and services, which in turn maintains good customer
relations, business confidence, output and profit.”
MC Fire Protection supplies and maintains
fire safety equipment and provides fire risk
assessment and consultancy services.
The company employs nine people.
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Nanotron Technologies
is a leading provider
of location information
and energy-efficient data
communication systems
delivered over a single
wireless link in real time.
The company has
22 employees.
ISO standards open
up export markets
for your goods and
services
“ Harmonized standards make market
access easier, particularly for SMEs,
due to reduced cost and time to market. Moreover, standards can enhance
brand recognition and give customers
the guarantee that the technology is
tested and reliable. Nanotron has a
patent-protected technology for local
positioning solutions (LPS), which is
complementary to GPS indoors and
outdoors. It follows ISO/IEC 24730-5*
for global asset tracking and includes
the essential IP for precise and robust
ranging. The competitive price-toperformance ratio of our system
solutions enables access to growing
mass markets for real-time location
systems (RTLS). However, such global
market penetration necessarily
requires standardization.”
Jens Albers
CEO
Nanotron Technologies Ltd.
Germany
* ISO/IEC 24730-5:2010, Information
technology – Real-time locating systems
(RTLS) – Part 5: Chirp spread spectrum (CSS)
at 2,4 GHz air interface, is one of an extensive
series of information technology standards
published by ISO.
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Moselli Industries Ltd. manufactures quality soap
powders and other cleaning products and is the
sole distributor of Italian Hyproclean products
ISO standards open doors
to new customers and
strengthen your existing
business
“Solid foundations are the makings of a
good business and ISO standards provide
the bedrock for small businesses wishing
to expand their customer base. By applying the ISO 9001 quality management
system to our small business, we have
improved the quality of our processes and
decreased the costs incurred by inefficient
practices. This may create business opportunities that were not available before an
objectively verified quality management
system was in place. Although Moselli
Industries Ltd. only employs five permanent and two part-time staff, we have been
able to successfully implement, and benefit from, ISO standards.”
Moses Maina
Director
Moselli Industries Ltd.
Kenya
in Kenya. The company employs five permanent
staff and two part-time workers.
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6
ISO standards help you compete
with bigger enterprises
“ As a small company with only large competitors in the
heating industry, Conematic has to produce a level of
quality that exceeds what the competition is doing. We
are on the point of entering the US market where we
expect a big scale-up in demand. Scalability is imperative if we are to accelerate production and compete with
the big players in the business, and ISO 9001 gives us
the process control to do that. We need that control more
now than at any time in the last 10 years. During that
period, we have taken 75 % of labour time out of production and assembly, yet we produce five times as much.
ISO 9001 is the perfect tool for managing that degree of
scalability in the supply chain, helping us ramp up our
productivity and our competitiveness.”
Doug Smith
President
Conematic
Heating Systems
Canada
A privately owned company employing up to
20 people, Conematic Heating Systems is a
leader in home heating technology, supplying
advanced heating appliances to the NorthAmerican domestic market.
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Raymond Tan
Executive Director
Tan Seng Kee Food Pte Ltd.
Singapore
Tan Seng Kee specializes in a range of riceand wheat-based noodle food products sold
in Singapore under the Kang Kang brand.
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The company employs 48 people.
ISO standards enhance your
credibility and secure customer
confidence
“As a knowledge-based noodle manufacturer,
we share the wonders of good flavour through
constant innovation and creativity in our products and services. With comprehensive systems
in place, such as the ISO 22301*-based business continuity management (BCM), HACCP**,
and gluten-free certifications, we aspire to build
a stronger, more resilient and more sustainable
business to safeguard the interests of our customers and other stakeholders. We believe that
achieving certification to ISO 22301 and acquiring
operational readiness in emergency situations
will enhance our credibility as a preferred supplier
and give customers peace of mind when doing
business with us.”
* ISO 22301:2012, Societal security – Business continuity
management systems – Requirements.
** HACCP – Hazard Analysis Critical Control Points.
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ISO standards sharpen your business
processes and increase efficiency
“Rentes Genevoises had long been engaged in a process
of sustainable development through its various business
activities, and most notably via its real-estate investments.
Yet we still lacked the tools to enhance our credibility and
showcase our commitment. Thanks to our ISO 50001*
certification, we have been able to meet these goals and
involve our partners, suppliers and tenants in a common
objective. This has been the catalyst enabling us to evolve
and integrate all our stakeholders in our long-term vision
for sustainable energy management.”
* ISO 50001 is ISO’s energy management standard providing
the framework for a more efficient use of energy.
Established in 1849, Rentes Genevoises
is the oldest contingency-fund company in
Switzerland, specializing in financial security
and the service of annuities.
It has 31 employees and one-third of
its total assets is invested in real estate.
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Pierre Zumwald
CEO
Rentes Genevoises
Switzerland
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Masterspec, Construction
Information Limited has
a staff of 12 and is New
Zealand’s market leader in
specification systems and
supporting software for the
construction industry.
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ISO standards strengthen
your marketing pitch
“As the provider of specification systems
to the New Zealand construction industry, Masterspec represents an important
quality benchmark for owners and users
of the built environment. The use of a
wide range of local and international
standards, which helped to define compliance with all aspects of health, safety
and performance, has been critical to this
success. A key component was ISO 9001,
adopted in the Australasian region as
AS / NZS 9001, Quality management
systems. The standard’s assistance in
meeting both customer and statutory
requirements supports the Masterspec
marketing approach of ‘always placing
customers and quality first’ – and it certainly reinforces our selling proposition in
a competitive environment.”
Rolf Huber
Chief Executive
Masterspec, Construction
Information Limited
New Zealand
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ISO standards
help you comply
with regulations
“ISO standards not only help you comply with regulations – in conjunction with third-party certification by
an accredited certification body –, they also help you
demonstrate to potential customers and authorities
that you are doing things ‘by the book’ and providing
quality products or services. In my business, which
specializes in training recreational divers and diving
instructors, the lack of any specific national regulations has led many countries to naturally accept the
ISO series* of standards on recreational diving as
being ‘the book’ to go by. One country in particular,
that made the ISO standards a legal requirement
for its dive centres, registered a 24 % decrease in
the number of diving-related accidents over a twoyear period.”
* ISO has published a series of standards on recreational diving
services, including ISO 24801, ISO 24802 and ISO 24803,
designed to make scuba diving training programmes safer.
Martin Denison
Managing Director
Scuba Schools Tauchausbildung
Scuba Schools Dive Training
Austria
Scuba Schools Tauchausbildung is a
registered diving centre in Vienna which
specializes in training recreational divers
and diving instructors, as well as producing
training materials. It has three full-time staff
and several freelance instructors.
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Get a head start
We also have a number of guide books
and checklists to assist you every step of
the way. For example :
• ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 guides
for SMEs – two handbooks for
implementing the best-selling
quality and environmental management standards.
• ISO/IEC 27001 for small businesses
The right standard for the job
At ISO, we have a portfolio of over 19 500* International Standards
covering all aspects of business and technology. Not sure which to
choose? Our Website – www.iso.org – will provide all the information
you need to help you select the right standard for your business. But
just to get you started, here is a shortlist of some of our most popular
standards, which have helped thousands of organizations worldwide.
– practical advice on managing your
information technology securely to
reduce your business risks.
• ISO 22000 food safety management
systems – an easy-to-use checklist for
small businesses in the food chain.
Find out more :
www.iso.org/iso/iso-and-smes
• ISO 9001 – Quality management
• ISO 14001 – Environmental management
• ISO 22000 – Food safety management
• ISO 26000 – Social responsibility
• ISO 28000 – Supply chain security management
• ISO 50001 – Energy management
• ISO 31000 – Risk management
• ISO 20121 – Event sustainability management
• ISO 27001 – Information security management
*January 2014
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What is ISO ?
ISO standards help
break down barriers
ISO, the International Organization for
Standardization, develops International Standards in an open, impartial
and consensus-based process.
to international trade,
which facilitates global
exchange and promotes
sustainable growth.
More useful links
How we develop standards to suit your business
• ISOfocus, ISO’s flagship magazine is
published six times a year in English
and French
www.iso.org/isofocus
ISO standards are developed by teams of experts from all walks of life – business and
industry, trade bodies, consumer associations, academia, and government agencies.
Countries that are interested can volunteer experts to take part in the process. A lot
of ISO committees include members who run SMEs just like yours, which ensures
your point of view is always taken into consideration when developing the standard.
Being actively involved in the development of standards has widespread benefits
for SMEs. If you are interested in getting your voice heard, contact the ISO member
body in your country at www.iso.org/isomembers.
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• ISO videos
www.youtube.com/PlanetISO
•
Follow us on Twitter
www.twitter.com/isostandards
•
Join us on Facebook
www.facebook.com/isostandards
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International Organization for Standardization
ISO Central Secretariat
1, chemin de la Voie-Creuse, Case postale 56
CH - 1211 Genève 20, Switzerland
www.iso.org
© ISO, 2014
ISBN 978-92-67-10622-9